SALISBURY – “I am blessed.”

With these words, Caren Landis from Salisbury described her life before and after receiving the ReWalk Personal Exoskeleton mobility device and thus the opportunity to take her first steps after 10 years of being unable to walk.

Landis said she had a bicycle accident but didn’t focus on her past, saying, “I’m broken and I need to get back on my feet.” She now looks gratefully at what she has and her future.

Her journey to her device, or as she calls it, Luke ReWalker, began before she was contacted by the folks at Lifeward. It was 2017 and she was participating in a Burke Rehab study in New York.

She said they had some great people there at Burke Rehab and they suggested she take part in the study and she agreed. It wasn’t the ReWalk, she noted, but a different version and it was hard, uncomfortable and tough and she just didn’t think she could do it.

“I know I only did it for those months, but I couldn’t imagine my life moving forward in it,” Landis said.

In 2023, she received a call and the person on the other end greeted her with “Hello, how are you?” And Landis responded with “Who are you?”

The response on the other end was, “My name is Michelle Wilson Price and I’m with ReWalk (now Lifeward). Would you like to try it?”

Landis remembered her experience in 2017 and said no. Price, who had found her through that study, told her about the advances in the devices and that her life could be wonderful.

“I have an amazing life,” she said, sharing that her life includes people who love her, Becky Wilborn, who has been in her life for 35 years, her family and her dogs. She also leads a very active life, playing pickleball at least five days a week and water skiing and jet skiing, and she can’t imagine it being more amazing.

“Don’t you want to run?” Price asked her, and after a pause, Landis replied that it would be nice, but then added, “It’s not the end, that’s what people don’t understand. People think my life is miserable because I can’t run. It’s not. I’ve come to terms with it. I’ve moved on, which allows me to really live my life to the fullest.”

Price told her that her life could be better and encouraged Landis to try the device.

On September 26, 2023, Landis met Luke ReWalker for the first time during her first rehab session at Atrium Health Cabarrus Outpatient Physical Therapy in Concord. She said she was excited at the time.

Landis, Wilborn and another friend, a retired physical therapist who wanted to check out the device, went to the rehab session and there she met Price, an occupational therapist, and her team of Lauren Dudas, a physical therapist from Colorado, and Kaitlin Luffman and Kelly Rachmiel, therapists at Atrium, of whom Landis said, “We learned as we learned. It was a learning experience for all of us and they are top notch. I’ve had a lot of physical therapists and they are top notch.”

All of these people she has met on this journey have been incredible and are available to her when she needs them. Besides the therapists, she also mentioned Wai Lee, who came quickly from Texas and fixed Luke when she had a problem with one of the boards, and she noted how incredible he was as well.

From September to January, she went to rehab three times a week for 90 minutes, and in January she was able to take Luke home, “and it was very exciting,” Landis said.

This was only possible when Wilborn, Landis’ support system, was able to do everything the therapists could with checklists so they could both get it done.

Therapy for Landis continues weekly, and Luke also has regular check-ups to make sure he is doing well, she said.

She said her first therapy session was scary, but the team encouraged and supported her. She made videos of this first milestone.

“Kelly and Kaitlin never gave up on me. They were constantly filming us and finding out where I made a mistake that other people wouldn’t film,” Landis said.

She has her own videos of her therapy sessions and noted that she gained confidence and speed in November.

“I can tell you what every inch of the floor in the physical therapy clinic looks like. I know it like the back of my hand and the palm of my hand because I used to stare at it all the time and now I don’t have to,” Landis said.

The first time she walked with Luke through her neighborhood, she was afraid of the things on the street, kept her eyes on them and didn’t look up.

Although she now looks out for foreign objects, sticks, and other things that might cause her to slip, she is no longer startled by things while walking.

“Now I don’t care what I step on. I know where every crack is. I know where everything is on the road. I just stay alert,” she said.

She can do the same when they walk on the village square, as they know it well. However, Landis mentioned that she feels uncomfortable on the sidewalks because they are uneven.

“I could get over it,” she said, “but then I’ll have to really concentrate.”

Therapy offers Landis the opportunity to work on difficult areas. Ramps are hard, she says, but for her, “the absolute hardest thing is going up a curb because it’s just a curb and there’s no railing to hold onto. I rely on crutches,” she says. “I still go back and work on it. I can do it, but when I get there, I think, ‘It’s a curb, it’s a curb.'”

But she doesn’t let that stop her, she says, “because it would stop me. So I keep going,” and that’s just one of the lessons she’s learned during her therapy. Others are: keep trying, keep going, and you’ll never learn anything unless you fail.

Landis emphasized that learning with her buddy Luke ReWalker has been a gradual process, and she noticed several problems the two had to solve over time, including learning how to collapse gently.

She said they teach you how to fall gracefully, something she tries to avoid, just in case something goes wrong and it shuts off. If that happens, you sit down and gracefully sit on the ground, she explained.

“It’s going very slowly, but you get scared when you hear the collapse and you’re carrying 30 kilos more on your shoulders,” she said.

Landis told how it happened to her. It was one day when she and Wilborn were walking around the neighborhood, and suddenly she realized something was wrong.

When she felt one leg give way, she shouted that she was falling to the ground and that she had to be lowered to the ground with her leg straight because Luke had turned. There she lay, she said, on the side of the road, grateful that there was not much traffic, and said, “I am a speed bump.”

Unable to unbuckle Luke due to the uncomfortable position, they didn’t know what to do when a neighbor came by, looked out the window and asked, “So is that Luke?” And Landis replied, “Yes, that’s Luke, and we’ve become a brake.”

At this point everyone starts laughing and with his help they manage to free her from the device and get her and Luke into his vehicle and take them home.

After she contacted the company, they sent her a new battery. When it turned out that wasn’t the problem, Lee quickly came and took care of the circuit board issue.

“I think just knowing that the company is behind you is a really big deal for me,” Landis said. “I think that’s great.”

They now laugh about the speed bump episode, Landis said, noting that their lives have been full of laughter.

She said the machines are built to her measurements and can be adjusted to fit you, but “you can’t be that big,” as she demonstrated with her hands, emphasizing the “like that.” It depends on the severity of the injury, meaning where you hurt yourself. She noted that her injury was minor. Also, she said, you need to be able to use your hands and arms.

ReWalk Robotics’ exoskeleton has a wrist controller with many functions, but, she said, you can press the buttons on the controls and use bypass mode and control directly from the leg and thigh panels.

Owning the Luke ReWalker has provided several benefits for Landis, she said. Her bones are stronger and her circulation is better. She also has a sense of normalcy when working at the counter in the kitchen and can turn and walk from one end to the other without having to keep the cutting board on her lap or on a table. She can also turn by leaning to one side and move forward in tight spaces or turn around while walking.

And she said with a laugh: “When you’re broken and you stand up again, a lot of things can change for you. The first time I stood up, I was so tall. I haven’t been 5’6″ for years.”

She also pointed out the various control panels, charger and other features that help Luke with balance and support, as well as the computer that can display how many steps she is taking, among other things, but in her view, these are not as important as the fact that she is taking those steps.

“I feel sorry for the people who don’t have support,” Landis said, praising everyone who has supported her along the way, including Wilborn and everyone who works at the company, saying how great they all are.

And if Price called today and asked about the device, Landis said, “there’s no way I could thank her. What she did for me changed my life. What ReWalk did for me changed my life. What Lauren Dudas did for me in Colorado changed my life. What Kelly and Kaitlyn did for me and continue to do for me because I go there twice a week changes my life every single day. They are my lifeline every week that keeps me afloat.”

Note: The following was shared by Landis, who received it from Lifeward/ReWalk.

“On April 11, 2024, Medicare finalized its reimbursement for personal exoskeletons. ReWalk is the first personal exoskeleton covered by Medicare for an eligible beneficiary based on that individual’s medical necessity. Lifeward (formerly ReWalk Robotics) is proud to have reached this milestone and is committed to providing more people with SCI access to life-changing technology. With this final decision, medically eligible beneficiaries can pursue the benefits of walking again with confidence and clarity in the reimbursement pathway.”